Astronomy In Reverse
by The Mysterious Blind Bandit
Summary: Healing, stargazing, and time travel. Or: Steven and Pearl have an important conversation in the wake of Peridot's revelations, and both regain a measure of peace. 'Back to the Barn' episode tag.


Being thrown about like a rag doll and hammered into the ground wasn't a particularly pleasant experience, to be certain. But Pearl had had far, far worse, and the sting of scrapes and formal defeat and bruised knuckles all rapidly faded when faced with Steven's concern and Amethyst's enthusiasm and, especially after everything that had happened between them, Garnet's pride.

And then, of course, Steven's impassioned defense of her, just when she'd been so _worried_ -

Peridot didn't even rank, really, and Pearl refused to let her have any more importance, or power of whatever kind.

The sun had long gone down by the time she made some real headway with the drill blueprint outlines. And there was Steven, in his favourite yellow pyjamas, getting ready for his first night up on the barn loft as Department Head of the UUU Space Travel Gem Drill Division, probably coming to get his good night hug and kiss.

"Oh no," he gasped out suddenly as Pearl knelt down and reached for him, making her jump and want to reach for her spear instead. "Pearl, are you okay?"

He was pointing at her scraped up right hand - marks that Pearl had, rather childishly and self-indulgently, in her own opinion, decided to keep around. At least for a little bit. It felt nice to have such tangible proof of… well, some sort of progress and payback, at least, along with the vivid recollection of the vise-like quality of Amethyst's hug, and the warm, reassuring weight of Garnet's hand.

"This?" Pearl twisted her wrist around and wiggled her fingers in an attempt to prove just how perfectly fine she was doing, ignoring the unpleasant pull of the torn skin on her knuckles. "Oh, it's nothing at all, you don't need to worry about it."

"But _Peeearl_ ," Steven let out a rather miserable-sounding whine. "You're hurt! I don't have my healing powers right now, but I can still help! Don't move!" With that, he ran off back towards the barn to rummage through his backpack, ignoring Pearl's increasingly feeble protests.

She made another short-lived attempt to stop him upon his return. "Steven, I really don't think that's necessary…"

"You always take care of me, Pearl. Now I get to take care of you! Look, I even brought the kit dad got me - it's my responsibility to be prepared in case of workplace injuries! And I'm sure this counts."

Pearl squinted at the bright white and red plastic case with a dramatically weeping apple embossed on the lid. "Are you sure that's a regular, legal first aid kit?" In all fairness to it, the apple _did_ have a chunk bitten out of it, so perhaps that was why it was so upset?

That gave Steven pause. "I- I don't know! I gave all the Sad Spoon and Crying Pear stuff to Connie last week, because they're her favourites. Maybe it doesn't satisfy workplace regulations anymore?"

He was growing genuinely worried at the thought, clutching at his head, and Pearl couldn't cut in quickly enough. "Oh, no, no, no, Steven, I'm sure it will be fine! After all, Greg's the CEO, right? I'm confident that if anyone made sure everything was… according to regulations, it will have been him."

She hoped the cringe wasn't noticeable - her wishes were granted, as Steven was already too busy gently pulling her hand over to rest on his knee, and unwrapping a band-aid with an obviously emotionally devastated bit of breakfast food on it.

"I never wanted you guys to fight," Steven began, unusually subdued, carefully aligning the cartoon waffle - according to him, the most important and healing-potent part of the medicinal item in question - with the worst of Pearl's injury. _Of course you didn't_ was on the tip of Pearl's tongue, but she decided to let him continue uninterrupted. "I just thought that, if Peridot got to see some of the really, really cool things you knew how to build, she'd stop, but…"

Pearl sighed, as she often caught herself doing when faced with explaining things she never really wanted Steven to understand. "Sometimes… sometimes people don't actually want to see the proof they demand of you. They're just trying to catch you unprepared, and they'll keep challenging you until they see you fail, or until you get too frustrated and angry at the unfairness to be taken seriously, all according to their often incredibly arbitrary and shifting standards."

Steven frowned, and refocused on layering garishly coloured band-aids on Pearl's hand. There were currently at least three crying waffles, one very watery-eyed grapefruit, and two highly upset cartons of milk applied to her knuckles, and Pearl found her finger mobility was rather impaired. It was, of course, not particularly relevant - she had some soldering to do on the basic circuit boards, and she could easily do that one-handed. Besides, it was completely worth it if it managed to make Steven feel better.

"She was saying some really mean things to you. And about you," Steven piped up again and Pearl figured a shrug and _I've heard much worse_ wouldn't be the right thing to offer here. Thankfully, he continued before she even had a chance to speak up at all. "I wanted to make sure you knew she was wrong."

"Oh, Steven," she extricated her hand and pulled him into a hug. "I know. I promise, I know."

"Are you… sure?" The little quaver in his voice was telling. The thought of the omnipresent cameras in the old wreck of the colony ship sprung to Pearl's mind immediately, and the then-barely-registered revelation of her and Garnet's reconciliation having been broadcast for all - or, well, Steven and Amethyst - to see. And in the background of it all, an annoyingly persistent murmur of _liar, liar, liar, liar_. But that one she dealt with daily, and knew how to handle, most of the time.

In the end, it was easiest to hug him very tightly. "I'm sure, Steven," she murmured into his hair, relieved to feel him relax and return the embrace. "But I'm glad I have you around to remind me, anyway. And Amethyst and Garnet, as well."

"Can I stay out here with you for a bit?"

And oh, the large, pleading eyes were out in full force tonight, it seemed. "All right," Pearl couldn't but acquiesce, no matter how much she'd occasionally nagged at Garnet for some of her more… permissive decisions when it came to Steven's upbringing. "But only for another hour. It's almost past your bedtime, and I don't want to see your routine disrupted any worse than it already is."

Steven smiled widely at her, then ran off to store his remaining medical equipment. Pearl got one of the beat-up plastic deck chairs they'd scrounged up from who knew where and placed it a little further away from the barn itself, in a spot chosen by Steven for what he claimed were optimal stargazing conditions. He clambered into her lap the moment she sat down and leaned back, and they gazed out into the darkness in a comfortable silence.

It was Steven who broke it, very hesitantly. "I don't think it sounds like a very nice place."

There was no need to specify what he was talking about, of course. Pearl thought of the splendour and the grandeur and everything that stood behind it - and everything Rose had very emphatically claimed to not miss at all, ever. "It was… very beautiful, Steven. Very grand. But no, I guess it wasn't very nice. Nor has it changed for the better, according to what Lapis Lazuli had to say."

Steven squirmed in her grip, and Pearl found herself almost clinging to him - ridiculous troublemaking tantrum-throwing bathroom resident or not, Peridot's kidnapping attempt cast a long shadow.

"Pearl?"

"Yes, Steven?"

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I…" She wanted to say _you weren't ready_ and _you're too young_ and _it's all in the past_ , but instead she bit her tongue and opted for forcing out the truth. It was the least she could do, really, and he deserved it, and there was hardly any harm left to be done now. "I didn't want you to think… differently of me."

Maybe it had been selfish of her - she knew plenty of things over the years had been. But Steven started fidgeting again in that way that let her know he had more questions - and ones he was sure she wouldn't like him asking. But she'd promised herself and promised them both she'd do her best, and that was what she fully intended.

"What Peridot said - did… did mom… _own_ you?"

Pearl couldn't help but cringe at the word, dug up again. It made her think of how long it had taken her to shake off some of its more insidious claws, and the effort it had taken to fully accept that if things happened to be a certain way on Homeworld it didn't mean they _had_ to be that way. It felt surprising - in a good way, perhaps - to see just how ingrained that belief had become in her, and how ridiculous so much of what Peridot was spouting at them had immediately been. She was proving to be a good test, if nothing else, and a stretching of figurative muscles that had lain mostly dormant for millennia, as isolated as they'd all been.

But Steven had asked a question.

"For a while, formally, yes. But she refused to act like it. Always bucking convention, full of radical ideas… your mother was truly something else, Steven."

Steven turned around in her lap, and buried his head in her chest with a small murmur. "I'm sorry."

"Whatever for?"

"That she's gone."

The words were so quiet and muffled Pearl could barely make them out, but when she finally did they felt like one of Amethyst's more unpleasant pranks involving buckets of cold water. "Steven. Look at me. Please," she let go of him in order to be able to tip his head up to face her. Noticing the way he was biting his lip and the way his eyes were swimming made Pearl's own water in turn, and it hit her with great force just how very small he was, how much he needed all of them, and how badly they sometimes seemed to fail him. "It's not your fault, and none of us blame you. I'm sorry we… _I_ \- ever made you feel like we did. That was… that was very… bad of me."

"But you miss her so much!" Steven protested, the sudden increase in volume making Pearl cringe. "And you can't make me believe it's all okay, Pearl - I can tell, because you get sad, and sometimes you stand and look at the painting above the door when you think no one can see you, but _I_ can, and you stop pretending for a bit."

Pearl cringed, again, and wondered in how many small and unconscious ways she'd managed to hurt him. "I do miss her, Steven. I do. But…" The many implications and intense feelings behind and tangled up in the old words _giving up my physical form_ and _can't both exist_ and _be good to him, I know he'll be wonderful_ rushed back in waves Pearl was never quite prepared for. She'd never been prepared for any of it, none of them had - and yet here they were, and here he was, and something else had become very true in the meantime, as well. "But I'd miss _you_ even more."

It was something she found she very badly needed him to believe. As she rubbed his back and ran gentle, soothing fingers through his curls, listening to his breathing slowly even out, she hoped that, perhaps, he already did.

"Can you tell me about… about space? Maybe about… _over there_?" Came from somewhere above Pearl's collarbone in a vaguely sleepy murmur, accompanied by a slightly wobbly finger pointing at a particularly bright cluster of stars. The subject change wasn't subtle at all, but Pearl chose to roll with it, and she genuinely appreciated the caring and kind sentiment behind it.

"Oh, the Pleiades? They're lovely, and there is so much out there to see - it's a particularly wonderful region. You should remind me to show you some holograms sometime, maybe when Connie is over."

Steven's nod was felt more than seen, and Pearl went on. "But you know, in the end, what we see is… very, very old light. And sometimes, if it's coming from far enough away, the stars aren't even really there anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, Steven," she kept her voice soft, and angled more towards narration rather than lecturing, like she used to when he was smaller and refused to go to bed without a story. "A lot of the stars up there are a very long way away. Even with how fast it travels, it takes their light many of our Earth years to actually reach us - thousands, or tens of thousands, or even millions. By the time we're able to actually _see_ the star here on Earth, the star itself might look completely different, or it might not even exist anymore."

"So stargazing is like…" Steven's sleepiness seemed mostly gone, leaving him sounding quite excited, and Pearl couldn't even begin to resist the contagiousness of his eager smile. "It's just like time travel!"

"In a way, I suppose you could say that. Each little dot we see up there is a tiny window into the past."

She didn't mean to make it sound so bittersweet, and the connotations didn't fully register until it was out. But Steven didn't seem to mind, and was instead gazing, wide-eyed and entranced, at the beautifully clear night sky, free from any town's light pollution.

It was all just old, cold light, and there was very little comfort to be found in it, and most of all it paled in comparison to the bright new star she had right by her side. Pearl repeated this to herself as she looked up with him, and looked at him looking, unable to resist the pull of the smile on her lips.


End file.
